Biography

Dr. Anderson received his M.D. degree from Tulane University School of Medicine in 1976. He is board certified in Internal Medicine, Hematology, and Medical Oncology. Nearly 20 years of primary care experience in rural Louisiana stimulated an interest in public health, preventive oncology and population-based science, which brought him to the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in 1999 as a cancer prevention fellow.

As a Medical Officer in the Gastrointestinal & Other Cancer Research Group in the Division of Cancer Prevention (2000-2005), Dr Anderson designed, developed, and monitored chemoprevention trials in persons at risk for cancer. In May 2005, he joined the Biostatistics Branch to develop a research program in descriptive epidemiology. In addition, he maintains a clinical appointment at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, serving as a consulting Hematologist/Medical Oncologist.

Research Interests

• Breast cancer heterogeneity according to standard tumor characteristics and risk factors
• Breast cancer trends among men
• Ethnic differences among women with breast cancer
• Global breast cancer incidence and mortality patterns
• The impact of screening mammography in the general population
• Colorectal cancer

Keywords

Breast cancer, colorectal cancer, incidence and prognostic patterns, hazard rates, estrogen receptor, age frequency distributions, racial/ethnic disparities

Selected Publications

• Anderson WF, Luo S, Chatterjee N, Rosenberg PS, Matsuno RK, Goodman MT, Hernandez BY, Reichman M, Dolled-Filhart MP, O'Regan RM, Garcia-Closas M, Perou CM, Jatoi I, Cartun RW, Sherman ME. Human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 and estrogen receptor expression, a demonstration project using the residual tissue respository of the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) program. Breast Cancer Res Treat 113:189-96, 2009
• Anderson WF, Rosenberg PS, Menashe I, Mitani A, Pfeiffer RM. Qualitative Age-related crossover in breast cancer incidence rates between Black and White Ethnic Groups. J Natl Cancer Inst 100:1804-1814, 2008
• Anderson WF, Chen BE, Brinton LA, Devesa SS. Qualitative age interactions (or effect modification) suggest different cancer pathways for early-onset and late-onset breast cancers. Cancer Causes and Control 18:1187-98, 2007
• Anderson WF, Reiner AS, Matsuno RK, Pfeiffer RM. Shifting breast cancer trends in the United States. J Clin Oncol 25:3923-3929, 2007
• Anderson WF, Matsuno RK, Sherman ME, Lissowska J, Gail MH, Brinton LA, Yang X, Peplonska B, Chen BE, Rosenberg PS, Chatterjee N, Szeszenia-Dabrowska N, Bardin-Mikolajczak A, Zatonski W, Devesa SS, Garcia-Closas M. Estimating age-specific breast cancer risks: a descriptive tool to identify age interactions. Cancer Causes Control 18:439-447, 2007
• Anderson WF, Pfeiffer RM, Dores GM, Sherman ME. Comparison of age frequency distribution patterns for different histopathologic types of breast carcinoma. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 5:1899-1905, 2006
• Anderson WF, Chen BE, Jatoi I, Rosenberg PS. Effects of estrogen receptor expression and histopathology on annual hazard rates of death from breast cancer after primary diagnosis. Breast Cancer Res Treat 100:121-126, 2006
• Anderson WF, Jatoi I, Devesa SS. Assessing the impact of screening mammography: breast cancer incidence and mortality rates in Connecticut (1943-2002). Breast Cancer Res Treat 99:333-340, 2006
• Anderson WF, Schairer C, Chen BE, Hance KC, Levine PH. Epidemiology of inflammatory breast cancer (IBC). Breast disease 22:9-23, 2006
• Anderson WF, Jatoi I, Devesa SS. Distinct breast cancer incidence and prognostic patterns in the NCI's SEER program: suggesting a possible link between etiology and outcome. Breast Cancer Res Treat 90:127-37, 2005

Collaborators

DCEG Collaborators

• Nilanjan Chatterjee PhD; Susan S. Devesa, PhD; Mitch Gail, MD, PhD; Montserrat Garcia-Closas, MD DrPH; Ruth Pfeiffer, PhD; Phil Rosenberg, PhD; Mark Sherman, MD

Other NCI Collaborators

• Kenneth Chu, PhD; Graca Dores, MD, MPH; Stephen Hewitt, MD, PhD; Asad Umar, DVM, PhD

Other Scientific Collaborators

• Phil Grimley, MD, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences
• Don Henson, MD, The George Washington University Cancer Center
• Ismail Jatoi, MD, PhD, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences
• Paul H. Levine, MD, The George Washington University Cancer Center
• Arnold M. Schwartz, MD, PhD, George Washington University Medical Center
• Ruth O'Regan, MD, Emory University